Category: Learning tricks

This is the 21st century. This is the 3rd millennium. Yet somehow, we are still stuck behind, oblivious to the many opportunities the future promises, blind to its challenges and comfortable inside the bubble of a present conferred to us by the past. A bridge to the 21st century shakes that comfort zone. This newly… Read more

20 years ago, students and researchers had to go through card catalog drawers, organized in alphabetical orders, theme after theme, name after name, the same way you’d search for a definition in the dictionary or the encyclopedia. BORING! This approach, called “Brockhaus thinking” by Ulrich Weinberg, the head of HPI school of design thinking, no… Read more

For the past couple of weeks, I became literally obsessed with puzzles. I’d imagine the world around me with those thin and intricate lines of the puzzle cuts (not fun when driving). During that time, friends came to me for advice and this comparison between the game and life kept coming back. Again and again.… Read more

Forget the word purpose. We have been consumed by its overwhelming presence, impaired by its crippling absence and lost in the maze of the unforeseen future. It’s the time to change perspective. Take your eyes off the unfathomable layers of your future. Focus on the here and now, on what is already in your possession.… Read more

All the great endings have once had a beginning. What matters is neither when nor with whom. What really matters is how. How can you move from one point in time to another, and canalize that change in the direction you wish your life would take? How can you bring your “why” to life? I… Read more

Lifelong learning is not a luxury. In today’s socioeconomic environment that feeds on knowledge, we need to keep growing to better ourselves on all levels. But this comes with a challenge: how to document our discoveries without the structural benefits of educational institutions? Personally, I follow a documentation in three segments: framework, content and… Read more

A few months ago, I laid down a book on my desk at home. I looked at the blue cover and the golden letters that made the title. And I smiled. One single white crack ran through the spine of the book. I usually hate broken spines, but I didn’t hate this one. It actually… Read more

We do not study to acquire a set of facts and knowledge to spew on a paper, in an exam, although that’s what we so often do. The real reason behind learning is for us to create new knowledge. However, this act of creating doesn’t emerge from nothingness. Innovation is an original association of thoughts… Read more

How did Leonardo Da Vinci, Botticelli and Michel Angelo grow to become such venerated artists and come to shape the Renaissance and the history of architecture, painting, sculpture, and war among other achievements? At the time, artists learned in circles called “Botteghe.” These are multidisciplinary experiential workshops dedicated for artistry and creation featuring masters in… Read more

“Being in your Element is where your natural aptitudes meet your passion.” – Sir Ken Robinson. Robinson, the speaker behind “Does school kill creativity?” one the most viewed TED talk up till now, is a British expert in education, speaker and author. In his second book, Finding Your Element, he paves the way to self-knowledge and… Read more